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By  Scott Cameron

United States copyright law saves for the copyright owner the exclusive right to distribute copies of his copyrighted work. That is, of course, unless an exception applies. There are many exceptions, some of which can be confusing. Among the confusing exceptions is the First Sale Doctrine. According to the First Sale Doctrine, once a copyright owner has made an authorized sale of a copyrighted product, the copyright owner no longer has any rights to that copy of the product. The First Sale Doctrine sounds simple enough so far. Enter the Ninth Circuit.Continue Reading Are Foreign Sales “First Sales” Under Copyright Law? It Depends….

By Audrey Millemann

In Prasco, LLC v. Medicis Pharmaceutical Corp., 2008 WL 3546217 (Fed. Cir. 2008), the Federal Circuit Court of Appeals has further limited the test for subject matter jurisdiction in declaratory judgment actions. The court held that the test, previously expanded by the Supreme Court in MedImmune, Inc. v. Genentech, Inc., 127 S.Ct. 764 (2007), requires affirmative actions by the patent owner to establish a case or controversy satisfying Article III. Continue Reading Federal Circuit Further Refines Declaratory Judgment Jurisdiction

By Dale C. Campbell

A copyright holder has the right to specify the terms under which others may use his or her work. How the terms under which a third party may use a copyrighted work are described can dramatically affect the remedies available to the copyright holder when the terms are breached.Continue Reading LICENSE TERMS: CONDITIONS OR COVENANTS – WHY YOU SHOULD CARE

By James Kachmar

Last summer, I wrote about the appellate court’s decision in VL Systems, Inc. v. Unison, Inc. in which the Court struck down a “no hire” provision contained in a consulting agreement as violating section 16600 of California’s Business and Professions Code. Section 16600 provides “Except as provided in this chapter, every contract by which anyone is restrained from engaging in a lawful profession, trade or business of any kind is to that extent void.” This summer, the California Supreme Court in Edwards v. Arthur Andersen used the same reasoning to strike down a “non-competition” provision in an employment agreement.Continue Reading Edwards v. Arthur Andersen LLP The Death of Non-Competition Agreements?

By Jeffrey Pietsch

eBay let out a sigh of relief last month when a New York Federal Court ruled that eBay’s efforts to remove sellers of counterfeit goods was sufficient to combat the sale of fake Tiffany & Co. products. In fact, the court held that trademark holders, such as Tiffany & Co., are the ones responsible for policing the online market place for counterfeit products, not online “swap meets” such as eBay.Continue Reading Tiffany v. eBay: eBay Not Responsible for Counterfeit Goods